Steve Smith says the absence of Marnus Labuschagne in the Australia team that lost Friday’s one-day international against Sri Lanka by a record margin is not a pointer to the Champions Trophy.
The acting captain said the teams for both matches, which included all 16 squad members, had been chosen before the first game of the two-match series that Australia lost heavily in Colombo.
“We obviously changed up the two teams over the two games and everyone had a little bit of a run at it,” Smith said after Australia’s 2-0 defeat was sealed on Friday.
“We’ve got a good squad. Marnus has done well under pressure, so I’m sure he’s going to be spoken about for that first one-day match in Pakistan.”
Labuschagne has underperformed in Test cricket of late, going 28 innings without a century.
“We were certainly trying a few different things. I don’t think you usually see an Australian team make five changes day in, day out,” Smith said after Australia’s 174-run loss in the second ODI, their worst defeat against Sri Lanka.
“It was about everyone trying to get some time in the middle. We haven’t played one-day cricket for a little while and it was about getting back into the rhythm of it.
“We got outplayed by Sri Lanka. They played really well. Hopefully, we can take something out of it, move forward, and have a good tournament in Pakistan.”
Australia will be without their first-choice pace attack of captain Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood for the Champions Trophy, but Smith believes his new attack showed encouraging signs in the past two matches.
“They’ve been world-class performers for us for a long time so they’ll certainly be missed but it gives some guys an opportunity and I thought some of the guys who had an opportunity in the last two games bowled really nicely,” said Smith.
Sean Abbott, Aaron Hardie, Nathan Ellis and Spencer Johnson all had their moments, with Hardie taking new-ball wickets across both games.
Josh Inglis is dismissed. (Photo by Buddhika Weerasinghe/Getty Images)
It was the first time Australia have failed to win a match in any of the nine one-day series in Sri Lanka.
Sri Lanka have failed to qualify for the Champions Trophy despite this emphatic victory being their 11th bilateral series win in a row at home.
Sri Lanka’s previous largest one-day victory over Australia was 82 runs at the same venue in 2016.
While Australia avoided their lowest one-day score against Sri Lanka – 74 at Brisbane’s Gabba in 2013 – it was easily their lowest one-day score in Sri Lanka, going under the 124 they made at the SSC Ground in Colombo in 1983.
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